Another band, RIISTETYT from Finland, joined us for this tour but this is about RAW POWER.
So, During the first months of 1984 I spent time on the phone tracking down local punx in different cities in the U.S. to put on a local gig for us. I don't remember how I found them. Some through MRR and some I knew already from being so active in punk rock. Most I contacted had bought BCT tapes. I wrote to them because they lived in the cities we wanted to tour in. Of course, there was no Internet. We tried to make a tour schedule that was sensible, with no doubling back. In the end I flew to NYC and met the band there. I had been in letter and phone contact with them as the tour was being formed. The phone lines were not always good so there was sometimes some information drop outs. When RAW POWER arrived in NYC they barely brought anything to sell on the tour because they did not think the tour was going to happen. They brought 5 copies of You Are the Victim lp. I took home two and at the Berkeley gig Keith Morris bought one.
The tour almost did not happen because we did not have transportation arranged. I thought I could simply rent a van and go. It was not that simple.
Me and 2 of the guys went to a local rental agency and said we were part of a high school reunion locally. For some reason, I guess I'm a bad liar, they wouldn't rent to us. I still don't know why but I brought a credit card on the tour. For emergencies. The credit card both saved the tour and busted my financial chops. I had done the math and we needed to have a certain amount of money come in, on average, per show, for it all to come out even. What I hadn't figured on was the high cost of the van rental and fixing the engine of a van someone loaned us. I ended up renting a van from Hertz. It was due back about 8-22. So we came up with a plan that I would leave with the van after the Oklahoma City gig and drive it back to NYC to return it and then fly to Chicago to rejoin the tour which I did. The Hertz staff were shocked because we had put about 8,000 miles on the van or something and we had taken it to very nearly the limit that they let their vans go to before they sold them. Ha.
The whole tour we traveled mostly in the middle of the night and worked it so most of the guys were generally sleeping but made sure the driver always had 1 guy in the front passenger seat who stayed awake to keep him alert and help navigate. We didn't have any traffic accidents. This way, we arrived in the day time at the local punk promoter's house or directly to the site of the show and it left us some room to get lost and get found and we had fewer places we needed to stay at since we slept in the van while on the road for probably about 20 of the nights.
We barely arranged for any lodgings before the tour so we were always asking the guy who put on the local show if he could find someone to put us up overnight. In some cases like Indinapolis we stayed over night with Paul Mahern, who also put on the show. He lived in a lovely home with his wife and I think baby. His friend taped part of the recording of Screams from the Gutter which was recorded in the studio that Paul Mahern worked in and where his band the ZERO BOYS recorded. He showed me part of it and I was so surprised because the band played sitting down while at every show they were jumping around, particularly Giuseppe, Dodi and Davide while Mauro was very intense singing strongly into the mics. Davide did the screaming vocals for the RAW POWER/F. AUTHORITY songs. He was able to approximate the great screaming vocals of Silvo, the guy he replaced. The band only told me that Silvo couldn't make the trip so they found Davide to take his place.
I couldn't get over that the 5 guys were regular Italian young men, talking, enjoying themselves, having little verbal spats amongst themselves that lasted a coupla minutes, which all seemed very Italian, and then they'd get on stage and turn into this punk rock band that blew me away every single time I saw them. They suddenly shifted into this tight unit that knew exactly what they wanted to play and raced through each set. The speed and the fact there was a fuller sound with two guitars rather than just one seemed to please people. That and the band's clear pleasure, with facial expressions of being happy to be performing in America. Oddly, I've almost never ever heard Giuseppe's guitar, even after all those performances. It's one of the weirdest musical phenomenas I've ever experienced. Somehow his guitar sound was woven so deeply into the band's sound that I couldn't hear it individually. I think it's another reason they were so good.
Mauro was usually shirtless and bellowed out the songs and gave a brief 'thank you' several times through each set. I never got an impression that the band felt like they were doing something over and over again. I believe they got some energy and feeling from each city and local punk who put on the show and eachcrowd. And, it was clear they were very excited about touring theU.S. When I spoke to Mauro and Giuseppe in 2001 they told me that this was their 9th U.S. tour but that the 1984 one was the best.
Dodi was mild mannered, soft spoken and barely existed as a presence during the touring. He was very polite and smiling but pretty quiet. However, on stage he completely let loose. A coupla of the guys told me that in Italy during shows Dode jumped this much (with fingers showing me about 1 or 2 inches) but on this tour they see him jumping flailing his legs flying in the air.
Mauro spoke fluent English because he was living in England at the time. Davide spoke pretty darn good English, Elder spoke a little English and Dodi and Giuseppe basically only spoke punk, "gig, MINOR THREAT, guitar etc". I spoke about a hundred words in Spanish and they understood every single Spanish word I used as the two languages are very similar.
There was no equipment brought from Europe. So the band borrowed the amps and microphones of bands that were playing the show that night in each city. I had to ask Davide a few times to be careful not to blow out the amps as he seemed to go to some volume extremes at times. But it ended up working out fine with no equipment getting broken during the tour. Of course the boys brought their own guitars and Helder brought a big 'ol Italian cow bell. Wot a great sound. He tried to get access to double bass drums whenever possible. He is still the best live drummer I have ever heard.